MACRO contemporary art museum, Rome ITALY
2011, Permanent light work
The line of the horizon falls or rises; it is like a level suggested within the space of the staircase. The museum presents variable luminous levels that confuses visitors’ perception of altitude as they walk up and down the stairs.
This horizon moves: it is as if the MACRO museum takes visitors into a different space using vertically moving light that completely surrounds them. Visitors no longer know whether they are going up or down because the light sequences change, vary and fluctuate. The wall seems to move as the visitor goes up or down the stairs, whereas the visitor’s movement is independent and different. The space of the staircase is continuously reinvented: ultimately it provides no sense of direction, instead creating a new spatial dimension. The path taken by the visitor is diagonal but the space of the light installation transforms it into a vertical, mobile trajectory.
The chromatic value of the horizon varies, recalling not only the sunset but also the sun at its zenith. The colours of the lights are complementary, creating a powerful visual effect.
The vertical wall moves, and the space is transformed. The lateral, mobile dimension of the work creates a kind of instability and unframes the space.
Winner of the international competition for a light installation at the MACRO museum of contemporary art in Rome. The work consists of 22 horizontal luminous strips made up of Led tubes, programmed to change every few seconds. The rows of Led tubes change their chromatic configuration to create the idea of a change in level. For the 22 strips, there are 21 “tableaux” of different colours such as cyan and red. In total three colour pairings appear in succession: Cyan-Red; Orange-Indigo; and Dark Blue-Yellow. These are complementary colours. There are a total of 63 tableaux recorded in an uninterrupted loop, each creating a different horizon.